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I've known for a long time that online gaming is not what I, or any other number of dedicated roleplayers, want it to be. EverQuest and its ilk make it paradise for those who want to beat the crap out of a never-ending stream of monsters, but it's not exactly anyone's first choice for good storytelling and memorable characters. But for awhile there was a wonderful little program called WebRPG that I thought had the potential to revolutionize online gaming as we know it. But along the way its creators made a fatal mistake, and things were never quite the same after that.
Electronic Arts Inc., the largest U.S. video game publisher,is laying off 200 to 250 people from its online unit, about one-third of the staff of Redwood City, California-based EA.com. It was not immediately clear if the cuts would mean the elimination of any of the offerings on the EA.com site.
The problem with Online Role-Playing Games like Everquest and Diablo II is that they have nothing to do with Role-Playing. It's all click-and-kill, repeating the same actions and quests over and over again to gain power, money and items, with little thought given to character, interaction or true development on a personal level. But maybe that's because such things are truly impossible. Perhaps this recently discovered journal can explain what it's like to be a real character in a world bereft of meaning. Or perhaps it'll just emphasize the futility of trying to explain the inexplicable.
Star Wars is revered by millions, and the buzz about the upcoming online Star Wars game is increasing steadily. But what if, contrary to what everyone thinks, the game sucks? Because we all need a good laugh now and again, here are the Top 10 possible reasons the forthcoming Star Wars Galaxies MMORPG will totally suck, in chronological order.
In my last column, I explained why Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) do not involve very much real role playing. The genre of online role playing has a lot of potential, but it lies dormant, waiting for the right circumstances to awaken it's full potential. What MMORPGs need is to...
Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGS) are, for the most part, all boring wastes of time that have very little of importance to differentiate one from another. This is not to say that MMORPGs are not fun, because in their own way they can be. They certainly have the tendency to be addictive.
Are you a Linux user? Hate rebooting just so you can play a game of Counterstrike or run some Windows-centric application to perform a simple task because the boneheads didn't port it to Linux? Well there's good news, WINE is here for you. What is WINE? Read on to find out.
Anarchy-Online hit stores yesterday, and I had hoped to bring you a review of what was supposed to be the world's first and greatest MMORPG set in a science-fiction world. At the moment, the best thing I can say is that disgruntled gamers sick of blasting Daikatana will be pleased to know that there's a new outlet for their rage and frustration. But there's one key difference between Daikatana and Anarchy-Online; you can actually play Daikatana out of the box.
Games come and games go, but there's something odd in the air right now, something I can't quite place. Is it the smell of quiet desperation as traditional pen-and-paper games fall by the wayside, stomped flat by their flashier computerized cousins? Is it the end of an era, or just the end of the beginning? Kenshiro Aette speaks his mind.
One of the things I find most interesting about MMORPGS is how much money people are willing to spend for imaginary items. Have you ever spent that much on an object from an online game? Would you? Do you know someone who has? Are they in therapy now?
